The Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure offers ten recommendations for improving the version 2 and preserving “a strong definition of ‘open standards and specifications’ in a way that patent cartels do not qualify for the gold standard.”

These ten recommendations are:

1. Align the EIF 2.0 with the new General Principles from the Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (ISA) document, which calls for technological neutrality and adaptability, openness, reusability, privacy and personal protection of data and security.
2. Improve interoperability terminology to once again align with the ISA’s definition rather than the new watered down one.
3. Market Order and public constituency by creating better functioning markets with increased interoperability.
4. Deletion of Chapter 3 and its empty talk.
5. Administrative principles such as not tasking public administration with lobbying for political support of interoperability efforts.
6. Avoid capture and dilution of interest with weak phrases and definitions.
7. Adjust to public administrative needs.
8. Open standards, not open concepts, by reinstating the proper definition of open standards.
9. Open assessment and continuum to allow government bodies to assess where an offering falls on the “openness continuum”.
10. Problem-oriented approach by focusing on identifying and solving interoperability problems.

Other Organizations Speak Out

Other organizations have also expressed their strong concerns, such as the OW2 Consortium and the Open Source Software Thematic Group.

We previously wrote about what Microsoft had done to the NHS [1, 2, 3, 4], which is Britain’s national healthcare organisation. There is another scandal there and it relates to those who supplied software (iSoft is a Microsoft partner).

The Financial Services Authority has confirmed that it is starting criminal proceedings against four former directors of iSoft Group plc – the major provider of patient records software for the NHS’s National Programme for IT.

[...]

It said at that time that commercial director Steve Graham, and another employee, had been put on special leave following a company investigation into accounting irregularities in 2004 and 2005.

iSoft shares collapsed in the wake of that news and in September 2006 it emerged that the Department of Health had bailed out the struggling software firm with £82m of taxpayers’ cash.

What Else is New

Torvalds and others who are middle-aged (or older) males are often torpedoed using weakly-backed allegations (or insinuations/innuendo) of sexism; that does not seem to matter and won't matter when they treat men the same (or worse)

Linus Torvalds was not fully canceled; nor was Richard Stallman, who's still heading the GNU Project (under conditions specified by those looking to oust him; people who code for Microsoft GitHub and many IBM employees)

General Hugh Shelton, Chairman of the Board of Red Hat, explains (keynote in 2011 Red Hat Summit/JBoss World) that he was introduced to the system as part of a military campaign; it basically helped war, not antiwar

Techrights examines Red Hat’s (IBM’s) hypocritical claims about the Free Software Foundation, founded by Richard Stallman back when IBM was the “big scary monopolist”; IBM employees were prominent among those pushing to oust Stallman from the GNU Project, which he founded, as well

The (in)famous letter against Richard Stallman (RMS), which was signed by many Red Hat employees with Microsoft (GitHub) accounts, doesn’t look particularly good in light of recent revelations/findings; it increasingly looks like IBM simply wants Microsoft-hosted and “permissively” licensed stuff, just like another project it announced yesterday and another that it promoted yesterday

One might not expect this from a so-called 'charity'; the Gates Foundation's critics are often met with unprecedented aggression, threats and retribution, which make one wonder if it's really a charity or a greedy cult of personalities (Bill and Melinda)

The assault on the media by Bill Gates is a subject not often explored by the media (maybe because a lot of it is already bribed by him); but we're beginning to gather new and important evidence that explains how critics are muzzled (even fired) and critical pieces spiked, never to see the light of day anywhere

Microsoft buying GitHub does not demonstrate that Microsoft loves Open Source (GitHub is not Open Source and may never be) but that it loves monopoly and coercion (what GitHub is all about and why it must be rejected)

The European Patent Office (EPO) keeps granting fake patents that cause a lot of real harm (examiners are pressured to play along and participate in this unlawful agenda); nobody is happy except those who profit from needless, frivolous lawsuits

After contributing to the cancellation of Richard Stallman (RMS) based on some falsehoods perpetuated in the media we're seeing the sort of thing one might expect from IBM (more so now that it totally controls Fedora and RHEL)

The coup to remove (or remove power from) Stallman and Torvalds, the GNU and Linux founders respectively, is followed by outsourcing of their work to Microsoft’s newly-acquired monopoly (GitHub) and appointment of Microsoft workers or Microsoft-friendly people, shoehorning them into top roles under the disingenuous guise of "professionalism"